


Once, Twice, Three Times a Nightmare

by infectedscrew



Category: Batman (Comics), DCU (Comics)
Genre: M/M, Minor Swearing, Minor Violence, Nightmares, Panic Attacks, past trauma, reference to past character deaths
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-28
Updated: 2016-07-28
Packaged: 2018-07-27 06:29:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,568
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7607407
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/infectedscrew/pseuds/infectedscrew
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There are a lot of terrible things plaguing the night. It is always good to have someone who can kiss them away.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Once, Twice, Three Times a Nightmare

**Author's Note:**

> Tumblr Commission piece that ended up being a character-study piece for Jason Todd. Please enjoy! c:

The solid, heavy weight pressed deep into his chest, threatening to keep him down eternally. Every breath was a hazy struggle. As his lungs desperately sought air, his ears rang and his head swam dangerously. But he couldn’t open his mouth. He couldn’t draw in the oxygen his body was screaming out for. He knew he couldn’t.

The moment Jason opened his mouth he knew dirt would fill it. He knew the wet soil would choke him, stuff his nose and throat and suffocate in a whole new way that not even the weight against his ribs could accomplish. It had happened before. He was an expert on the matter and he’d be damned if he willingly let it happen again.

That didn’t stop his body from utterly betraying his mind. His lungs heaved, muscles straining and burning under the pressure. His throat spasmed, lips parted and suddenly he was gagging around dirt, around air and around nothing.

In the visceral panic that flooded him him, his hands lashed out. Nails dragged against wood, splinters sinking viciously into the tips of his fingers. He gasped, trying to push the weight, the dirt, the wood away from him. It wouldn’t budge. In its oppressive stillness, his thoughts raced. His heart pounded, promising to jump right out of his body. His lungs pleaded for a freedom he couldn’t offer.

Just as his vision narrowed, static at the edges and tried to blacken all together, a new feeling settled into the raging cacophony of his senses. At first it stung, bit at already fraying nerves. He jerked and tore away from it but it persisted.

A soft, constant warmth pooled at the base of his neck. He was sure it was blood, seeping from his own veins. He feared it as much as he craved the heat.

The warmth eased over his skin, tentative and searching. An unyielding, soft press spread over his exposed skin. Down his shoulders and spine, the new weight settled against him. One steady line passed over his arm, curling over his wrist. Smaller, gentler fingers threaded through his own, urging them to relax and pull away from the wood.

As his lungs ached, the muscles in his back sank into the heat. While the pressure doubled against his chest, his thoughts latched onto the one, good thing near him. He choked out a breath, maybe words and a soft voice answered him.

“I’m right here, Jay,” it murmured in his ear, just barely loud enough to cover the pounding in his head. “I’ve got you.”

Slowly, he unraveled. Tension bled from his body. Air replaced the dirt stuck in his throat, coating his tongue. With an agonizing wrench, his thoughts broke from the panic. Deep, exhausting relief swept through him; just as heavy but far less oppressive than the dark, horror that had settled against his chest before.

“Just a nightmare.”

The words crashed into his skin, an aloe over burning aches.

“Yeah,” Jason whispered, already returning to sleep but a vastly less tainted one. He was wrapped in Dick’s unwavering warmth and soothed by his voice.

\---

Jason knew that his life was a mess. It was a facet of himself that he had long ago accepted. Even before dying, he had always known that he was going to have to go much harder than anyone else if he wanted to survive. He wasn’t going to skate along and hope that something good came his way.

Park Row, Gotham, fuck even the whole damn planet didn’t work that way. He wasn’t going to let himself sink into the ever-present nightmare of crime that waited under the streets of his city.

Sometimes the nightmares were too strong. They rose up, dragging at his skin and did their damndest to finally bring him down to their level. He’d fought tooth and nail against them--once even literally--and on the times he couldn’t win against them, he had to seek the help of others. More often than not, the help came from Dick Grayson.

Back when he’d been Robin, they hadn’t had much to do with each other. Maybe the occasional training session or case bust but otherwise, Dick was firm about staying away from the Cave, from Bruce. When he’d come back from the grave, it had been an entirely different story. Dick was determined to do his family right, fix the scars and broken bones that Bruce had been too ashamed to fix himself.

Jason couldn’t count the number of times Dick had dragged him back from the roiling, black edge of sanity. He was sure it would be an embarrassingly high number. It felt as if at least one night a week was dedicated to Dick kissing away demons and wrapping him tight.

At first Jason had hated it--recoiled violently away from the contact and snapped at Dick to stay away. Their history hadn’t been kind to each other. Where Dick wanted to ignore it, pretend it had never happened, Jason clung tight to it, needing it to ground him in a world he wasn’t supposed to belong in anymore.

More recently, he had sought it out, searched for Dick after a moment of terror and rage. Or, more accurately, Dick found him first. Seeming to know when Jason’s heart was too weary, too angry, Dick appeared to ease him.

That night, his search didn’t take too long.

It wouldn’t take anyone long. They were all there, clustered around that giant, obnoxious computer screen that dominated an entire wall in the Cave. Even Babs was there, her expression grave and massive on one of the screens.

Bruce’s words rang through the cave with a finality that not even the bats high above dared to threaten. The brutal order echoed in Jason’s ears like buzzing bees, crawling into his skull and sinking stingers into his brain.

No one was moving, no one was speaking. 

Bruce was towering over Jason, taking away the few precious inches Jason had managed to grow above him. He was twelve again, a speck compared to the big, bad Batman. Which only made the rage thud violently through his veins.

It was Tim who moved first. He always seemed to be just a couple seconds ahead of everyone else and whatever blow out he envisioned, he clearly wanted to avoid. With the tentativeness that he only seemed to have around Bruce, he reached forward and grasped his mentor’s arm.

“Gordon sent the files,” he said, quiet, unwavering voice shattering the heavy silence.

For a second it didn’t seem like Bruce would react then he turned sharply, off-balancing Jason and sweeping to the computer. It was two short steps that effectively ended the argument.

Tim glanced at Jason, expression unreadable before he turned as well, joining the black shadow.

There was a creaking in his ears, replacing the lingering rasp of Bruce’s words. Belatedly he realized it was his jaw, his teeth clenched tight and groaning under the strain. He snorted and turned on his heel. His steps were decisive and heavy as he stormed out of the cave and up to the Manor proper.

Despite his fury, he would follow Bruce’s words. He had to. His heart still yearned to please, follow even if his mind fought against it, against the man that he’d lost years ago. Even if he listened, he still wouldn’t be happy about it.

Up stairs, in his old room, he grabbed the nearest thing he could and hurled it to the ground. The plastic water bottle bounced uselessly against the hardwood, utterly unsatisfying. He snarled a curse at it.

Behind him his bedroom door creaked open. He didn’t have to look to know who it was.

“He’s a fucking nightmare,” Jason spat, hands balled into fists at his sides. “How do you work with him?”

“Years of practice,” Dick answered easily. He closed the door and moved over to the bed. Dropping onto it, he pulled his legs up to sit lotus position. “Plus, he’s not wrong--”

“Don’t,” Jason hissed, stripping off his leather jacket with such speed that he was in danger of ripping it. He tossed it to the ground.

Dick arched an eyebrow, clicking his tongue once. It was a recent trait he’d picked up and Jason knew for a fact he got it from Damian.

Refusing to look at Dick, Jason continued yanking off his clothes. The fabric scratched at his skin, dragging static over his muscles. The clothes were dropped in a careful pile over his jacket to be, all of it to be picked up and deposited in the laundry. Dick watched him silently through the entire process.

Once he was down to his boxers he moved into the bathroom. Cleaning eased him but Alfred kept the Manor too damn perfect. Brushing his teeth, washing his face would help drown out his thoughts. It wasn’t enough but it would work.

“He is though,” Dick continued, tilting his head just enough to see Jason through the open door.

Jason gave an unintelligible, most likely rude response around his toothbrush.

“I mean, that doesn’t mean he wasn’t being a total dillrod when he said it though.”

Jason spit into the sink. “Dillrod?” he repeated.

“Among other things,” Dick said, not taking back his childish insult. “A total douche-nozzle.”

A chuckle escaped Jason. He dried off his hands and face. Towel clutched in one hand, he leaned against the doorframe, looking back at Dick.

“You need to stop hanging out with Tim,” he pointed out. “Those insults sound like middle school all over again.”

Dick shrugged, amusement pulling at his full lips. 

No one else in Jason’s life had lips as plush as Dick’s, save for maybe Kori. He didn’t think he’d ever find himself so attracted to someone’s mouth, but there he was. Not just how it looked but what it could do and what it could say. The acrobat’s voice wasn’t perfect, it broke sometimes, was too loud or too soft other times but it sank into Jason like a perfect shower. He focused on it, revealed in it.

“So Tim’s got a creative vocabulary.”

Silently, Dick lifted his arms.

Jason’s eyes narrowed briefly, muscles flexing as he fought within himself. He could take the offer, quell the storm still knocking against his joints or he could go back down to the cave and make Bruce understand.

“Going back down there won’t help,” Dick said, soft and knowing. “He needs time to settle, just like you do.”

“You look stupid with your arms up like that,” Jason grumbled, putting the towel back onto the towel rack.

Dick hummed, not minding the insult. He kept his arms raised, patiently waiting for Jason to make his choice.

The choice brought Jason into Dick’s hold. He pressed close, knocking the older man down as he burrowed against his chest. He was taller than Dick by a couple of good inches but that didn’t mean he wasn’t going to try and curl up as close and tight as possible. He didn’t move as Dick rearranged them into something more comfortable on the bed.

The chuckle that rumbled in his ear went a long way to relaxing him.

“I’ve got you,” Dick whispered, arms wrapping around him. The hold was just loose enough to let Jason escape but solid to remind him that he wasn’t leaving.

Jason sighed softly, closing his eyes.

“Hey! Get this,” Dick started, momentarily shocking Jason’s thoughts. “So you know how I had to go down to East End tonight? Well…”

The rambling story draped over Jason. He fell into it. While the hurt, the barked order still buzzed just under the surface, he could ignore it for now. His mind focused on the embrace, on Dick’s babbled story and the solitude of a room that belonged to a very different Jason.

\---

The landing was all wrong. The roof came up to meet him too fast and his line didn’t pull tight enough for him to rebalance. His boots hit the flat tar top and his knees buckled.

Instead of forcing his legs to stay upright, he fell with it. Jason let himself drop and roll to a stop. It wasn’t graceful but it was a damn sight less painful that making protesting joints keep his body standing when they clearly didn’t want to.

“That looked bad,” Dick said into his ear, the comm. catching for just a moment and distorting his voice.

Jason blew out a breath. He reached up to undo the catches on his helmet.

The thick, humid night air hit his face the moment it was free. The bridge of his nose crinkled in distaste. With the helmet off, he didn’t have the recycled air to suck down but he couldn’t keep his head trapped for a moment longer.

“You okay?” Dick pressed when Jason didn’t reply.

“Yeah,” Jason rasped.

The sky above him was smoky, starless and over-bright. Summers in Gotham were some of the worst of the entire year. Too many people were out, the heat was oppressive and a lot could happen in a single night. Like that night. Four robberies, two car chases, one attempted murder and three drug deals were catching up with him. He couldn’t wait for winter when only the really stupid or really hardened criminals were out. Right now it was a free for all.

Babs chirped in his ear, cutting through Dick’s next words. He always knew when it was her because the comm. lines went suspiciously clean and clear when she was around. How she did it, he never knew but he was sure that he could be on Mars and her lines would come through like she was standing right in front of him.

“Fire on 2nd and Morrison,” she clipped out.

A groan escaped Jason as he rolled up onto his elbows and pushed himself to his feet. He shoved his helmet back on, cool air caressing his cheeks in welcome.

“Apartment building. Mostly empty,” she continued, throwing out facts and necessary information.

“On it,” Jason said, pulling out his grapple. Just as it fired, he could hear Dick confirming that he would be going as well.

A deep tiredness was settling into his bones. It was almost four in the morning, most night-goers would be at home and the morning people wouldn’t be stirring just yet. Four was supposed to be quietest hour in Gotham but here he was running to find people trapped in a fire. He wanted to be in his safe house, he wanted to be in bed. His head was heavy, eyelids trying to close despite his best efforts.

“What was that?” He asked, knowing Dick said something.

“I said, it’s never-ending, huh? Always exciting!”

“No, it’s a goddamn nightmare. Not even Lucifer wants to hang out in a place like this,” Jason retorted. “But what hath night to do with sleeping, I guess.”

There was a silence over the comm. and Jason knew it had everything to do with the fact that Dick was trying to figure out where that quote came from. He smirked behind the hood, swinging over a roof top.

“Milton,” Jason supplied when the silence stretched.

Dick blew out a heavy breath. “Oh, that makes way more sense than what I thought.”

“What were you..?”

“Alfred.”

Jason snorted. He made his way over the city, hoping that the fire didn’t spread as they raced toward it.

“If you hate it, why did you come back to it,” Dick asked.

“I don’t hate Gotham,” Jason answered, not needing clarification.

“But--”

“I just grow tired of it. I want a break, yanno?”

There was a sound of agreement but it was the placating kind, not the kind that set Dick on his side.

“You don’t?”

The silence was different this time. Dick was searching again but for his own words, not trying to find the source of Jason’s. The silence wasn’t heavy like the air of Gotham. It was settling, reminding Jason that even on busy nights there was still time for conversation and a chance to relax with someone how knows his troubles better than anyone. Dick was just as good at silence as he was at talking. He knew how to turn it into something gentle instead of awkward.

“It can get hard sometimes,” Dick admitted. “But… Gotham isn’t mine, not in the way that it is yours or Bruce’s or even Tim’s. I wasn’t born here. So maybe I see it differently.”

“Tourist,” Jason teased.

Dick chuckled, “maybe. But I still like it, I’ve grown to love it. Even right now. At it’s worst Gotham is a city that fights back and thrives. It’s alive. We’re running toward a fire, a building is going to be destroyed but just two streets away there is a private club throwing a party because a young woman discovered some science-y thing.”

The juxtaposition was not lost on Jason. Gotham was always a city of two halves. It’s past and it’s future mingled in it’s rich and poor, just as violent as it was enduring. He was a dead man alive, he knew a thing or two about contradiction. Hearing Dick talk about it in such an admiring way whisked away from of the exhaustion that had settled over his shoulders.

“Yeah,” he mumbled, pausing on the edge of a billboard. He could see the fire, licking up toward the smoggy, orange sky but he could also see Gotham Tower reaching up toward the heavens with a defiance that would not be bowed by disasters. 

Out of the corner of his eye he saw Dick swing down through the air, effortless grace arching and bending. He pushed out again, practical and without flare. Two very different styles in a city that embraced them both.

“I need to see it keep changing,” Dick said. “I’ll fight the nightmares as long as I have to.”

It was a statement that brokered no argument. It hit Jason in the chest, promising that no matter what the city threw at them, he could always count on Dick to pull himself out of the rubble and fight on. Jason could count on Dick to always be just a little bit away to help him quell the fire.

“Yeah,” Jason answered with his own harsh determination.

\---

Leads had a curious ability to take Jason all over the place. Granted it was their job to, well, lead, but that didn’t mean he liked to follow. Especially when it took him down to Old Gotham, under the streets and into the crumbling ruins that had long been covered up by pipes and streets.

“Weird that this is all here,” Dick said, hands on his hips and look around the dilapidated builds and up to the ceiling high above them.

Faintly they could both hear the subway rumble overhead. An entire city tucked under subway tracks and most people didn’t even know it.

“Is it?” Jason answered absently. The location ticked just on the side of his hood, guiding him deeper into the tunnels.

“Kinda,” Dick replied, hopping a little to keep up. “A whole bunch of buildings that no one ever lived in and just sorta forgot about. I mean, sounds like something from a horror movie.”

Jason had to admit that it certainly did. He’d seen enough real-life monsters that the idea of something launching out at them didn’t so much scare him as it did prepare him to move. It was impossible to know what was lurking down in the former “future city”. Some homeless and criminals liked to sneak down there when the streets above got too rough. There was a chance one of them might not react too well to someone encroaching on their territory.

“Could you imagine one of those animatrons just bouncing up right now?” Dick eyed one warily, skirting around it as Jason labored forward. “All creaky and rusty and just creepy? Man! I wouldn’t know what to do.”

“Fight it,” Jason suggested.

Even with the mask on Jason could tell Dick had rolled his eyes at him.

“Okay, duh,” he sighed. “But still! Do you think they work?”

“Not even a little bit.”

Jason pulled to a stop when their path was blocked by a door older than Wayne Manor. He frowned at it’s massive rusted lock. He had to tilt his head back to see all the way to the top of it. From what he could guess it was a city entrance gate, closed forever and no longer letting anyone through.

“Side door?”

“If we can find one,” Jason said, looking away from the door and searching around.

After a few minutes of rustling around through dust and ancient garbage, Dick located a vent opening. It took very little effort to tug the cover off. With a screech, it was free and quickly discarded.

“Are you sure the dealer is here though? I mean…”

“That’s what the tip-off said.”

Dick shoot him a look. “You’re trusting it?”

Jason sighed. He knelt down by the entrance, not willing to answer for a moment. In the end, he sucked it up and replied.

“Red Robin does solid work. His leads are usually accurate,” he muttered.

Dick grinned, lowering himself down as well.

“Shut up.”

“I didn’t--”

“You were going to. Yeah, yeah, he’s good. Whatever, let’s go. Something about this place is making my teeth hurt.”

Not sticking around for Dick’s response, he pulled himself through the felt and crawled through. It was a short trek but each movement forward pressed against him, building his concern. Something in the abandoned city was off and he didn’t know what.

The grate on the other side was quickly kicked out and they were through.

“The pipes are on,” Dick stated as soon as they were standing again. “Something is in them.”

The giant room was huge, intricately carved and laced with technology that had never been used. At the time it would have been an achievement but it had long since been surpassed. Shooting up the center was a trailing line of dusty glass pipes. A dullish green haze leaked out of them. Dick’s observation was fairly useless but it was a start.

As Jason stepped toward it a shudder crawled up his spine. The green was familiar in a way he wanted to ignore but couldn’t. His gaze was locked on the pipes as he moved beside them, following them to their source.

The pipes fed through the floor, disappearing behind another, much smaller door. Unlike the massive gate the new door was unlocked and had been used rather recently, if the shiny, undusted door handle was any indication.

“Hood?” Dick started, concern in his voice. He had seen the tension mounting in Jason shoulders. “What is it?”

“I don’t know,” he got out but he had a burning suspicion.

There was a ringing in his ears and he was finding it hard to breathe. Distantly he was aware of his own hand raising to push the door open. It scraped against the door as it was moved, admitting them in a small chamber full of tubes that had probably been designed to power the city. In the center of the room was a pit.

“Is that?”

“I don’t know,” Jason gritted, but he did. He knew exactly what it was.

Screams, splashing water, distant shouts and the crash of bodies rumbled just beyond his consciousness. The chamber in front of him swam, meshing dizzyingly with a monstrous cave. A stern faced woman wavered in front of him, at the edge of the pit. She was there and then she wasn’t. Her voice was soundless but loud in his ears.

“Jay!”

Dick’s panic cut through him momentarily. The chamber settling briefly even as his muscles remembering being shorn apart and resewn into something new. The pit glowed bright as his eyes fought against the memory of being forced open again and having light flood in after so much pitch black.

“Hey! Come on, come back to me.”

Jason body was at the wrong angle. His shoulder and hip ached from where he had hit the ground but he couldn’t remember falling. All he knew was that he wasn’t standing any more and the floor was not in any way kind to him. He was moving and he wasn’t sure that he was the one doing it.

The pit disappeared from vision as he was dragged back and the door shut. He was aware then that his breathing was too fast, chest rattling with rapid beating of his heart.

Dick’s hands grasped his shoulders, drawing his focus to the touch.

“Look at me, come on. I’m right here, I’m real,” Dick said, sounding just as off-kilter as Jason felt.

After what felt like an eternity, he dragged his gaze up to Dick’s face. He desperately wished that the mask wasn’t there. Dick was real but Jason needed to see his eyes, see something that wasn’t contorted by black lines and lifeless lenses.

Jason reached up, catching Dick’s jaw. Through the gloves, he could feel the jut of bone and soft press of round cheeks. He sighed softly, eyes closing. His vision could always betray him but the steady weight of feeling couldn’t, at least not as easily.

“Sorry,” he rumbled.

In his hold he felt Dick shake his head. “Nothing to be sorry for,” he said, words just a little too firm.

“Still here,” Jason whispered, the words slipping out before he could stop them.

Dick shifted, drawing close. He practically dragged Jason into his lap as he wrapped his arms around him. It was an awkward hold, their legs bent and tangled and Jason unwilling to bend. Dick managed it, pressed against Jason and burying his face in Jason neck.

“Still here,” Dick confirmed.

The pit pulled away slowly, leaving Jason to recollect his sanity in Dick’s arms.

\---

“What’s it like?”

Jason paused, his hand stilling against Dick’s back. He frowned up at his ceiling, trying to understand Dick’s question. When he couldn’t, he tilted his head to look down at the man rest against his chest. The new angle didn’t help, he still couldn’t quite see Dick’s face.

“What?”

Dick shifted against him, turning to prop his chin against Jason’s sternum and meet his gaze. He had a peculiar look about him that Jason only really associated with introspection. It did not promise fun.

“Your nightmares,” Dick clarified.

It wasn’t what Jason had been expecting. He was sure Dick was going to ask about dying. Everyone did, inevitably. When things had settled between them, Bruce had asked. Damian had cornered him and compared notes, which had not endeared him to the tiny spawn in anyway. No one asked about nightmares. Everyone had them, especially in their line of work.

“Bad. Like yours, I’m sure,” Jason said, slowly, confused.

Dick shook his head, his chin digging slightly into Jason’s bone. He pulled away slightly when Jason winced.

“No, yours are worse. When you have them it feels like I can’t get you back out of them. You… It feels like forever.”

“You’re telling me,” Jason huffed.

Dick sighed, sitting up. He rubbed his cheeks, obviously trying to find his words.

Jason didn’t know what he was looking for. He crossed his arms behind his head, making a choice.

“They’re dark, sometimes. Like being buried again,” Jason started quietly, drawing Dick’s gaze back to him even if he refused to meet it. “I can’t breathe but I can hear dirt settling around me, it’s oppressive. Sometimes it’s… Seeing my mom and the bomb ticking down. Sometimes it’s about the pit. Mostly it’s just memories.”

Dick licked his lips before biting down on them, a hand settling on Jason’s chest. His brows were furrowed, gaze searching for something that Jason wasn’t sure he had.

“Not of… Him?”

“Who? The Joker?” Jason shook his head. “No. It was painful but I wasn’t scared when it happened. I was angry. I was… sure that Bruce would show up. The Joker doesn’t scare me even now, I just hate him.”

Dick nodded. He was trying to understand, making an effort for Jason.

“The pit was worse,” Jason said quietly after a moment. “It was everything at once. Total chaos. Most of the nightmares are that.”

Dick stared at him. He couldn’t relate, at all. He’d seen the pit, heard Ra’s and Jason both talk about it but he’d never experienced it--hopefully he never would. But he knew chaos. He’d been in the middle of it when Bludhaven had fallen, when Bruce had died and returned.

“But… Whenever I have them, somehow you show up,” Jason went on. “You’re this steadiness that I can focus on. It’s weird but… Good.”

Something brightened in Dick, taking away whatever had settled over him. He laid back down against Jason. One arm looped over his chest, holding tight.

“I wanna help,” Dick stated.

“You usually do,” Jason reassured, laying his hand against Dick’s back.

The nightmares would always be there, another messy component of his life. Much like everything else, he had long since accepted it. That didn’t mean he liked dealing with them but he was comforted by the knowledge that, if he was around, Dick could help fight them away. They had come a long way since his return from the grave. Dick’s constant reassurance that he’d kiss the demons away had helped with a lot of that and Jason wouldn’t do anything to jeopardize that.

 

\---

The bed dipped as Dick moved his legs over the edge. He curled over himself, head practically between his knees. His elbows dug into his thighs, hands covering the back of his neck.

Jason had woken the moment Dick shifted. He checked the time, vision a little blurry with sleep.

They hadn’t gotten back from patrol more than two hours ago--probably hadn’t been asleep for even half of that.

On the edge of the bed, Dick was shivering, breath coming in heaving gasps. He didn’t register Jason moving behind him. He didn’t react as Jason shifted close. 

Jason pressed his chest to Dick’s back, legs coming to rest on either side of him. The height he preened himself over came to full advantage as he folded himself over Dick. His arms looped around his middle and Dick started to babble.

“How long am I going to picture everything? Just all the blood and his body lying there,” Dick gasped out, voice wet and thick.

Jason was silent as he lowered his lips to the back of Dick’s neck.

“He was just so small. I couldn’t, he couldn’t--” Dick choked himself off, a harsh noise falling out of his chest.

Jason didn’t have to ask. He knew how much Damian’s death had affected Dick. Where Bruce had steeled himself, determined to defeat mortality for his own son, Dick had shaken apart. He had frayed at the edges as his family desperately tried to hold him together. Not even Damian’s return had solved it. Dick still watched Damian as if he would crumble to the ground again.

A tiny, selfish part of himself wondered if Dick would be the same if he died again. It was a foolish thought. Jason knew Dick would be ruined if he disappeared once more. Despite their night time choices, death hit Dick harder than the rest of them. The spectre of the Reaper haunted Dick far more than it did Jason.

“He’s back,” Jason murmured, staying close and unmoving. He could feel Dick shifting against him, wanting to relax back but not finding the ability to.

“I know, but what if… What if it wears off? What if it’s not permanent? What if something worse happens? You could die again and I’d have to bury you again,” Dick’s voice grew manic as more fears tumbled out of him.

Briefly Jason was startled at the switch from Damian to himself. He could follow after a moment. He’d had the same fears himself but where he had resigned himself to greet a familiar sensation, Dick clearly wasn’t anywhere near acceptance.

A quiet breath left him, blowing out over Dick’s clammy skin. His arms tightened.

“No one can guess the future--”

“That doesn’t help me,” Dick whined.

Jason clicked his tongue, rolling his gaze to the side even if Dick couldn’t see. He moved his hands up to Dick’s wrists, drawing his hands away from their tight grip over his own neck.

“Just listen,” he grumbled.

Once he was sure Dick wouldn’t speak, he moved on.

“He’s here and so am I. I’m with you,” he said, letting words he’d long kept hidden fall from his tongue just for Dick’s comfort. “I’m right here. I won’t leave you.”

Dick eased slowly, the tightness bleeding from his hands as he turned them to twine with Jason’s. His head still hung low but he pressed back against Jason’s chest and stomach.

“Yeah,” Dick agreed carefully, voice weak and wavering.

“It was just a nightmare.”

With the same, shaky slowness, Dick lifted his head and let it rest against Jason’s. Their temples pressed together, Dick’s damp cheek sticking to Jason’s. From the corner of his eye Jason could see that Dick’s were closed, clamped shut.

“Okay,” Dick whispered, tension easing from his face.

“I’m right here,” Jason promised, insistant and unwavering.


End file.
